Catch Me if You Can
by Skyla1
Summary: It started with some flowers. Then came the little gifts delivered to her work and finally the letters spouting poetic serenades of her demise. The clock is ticking, her admirer is getting closer, and there are too many suspects to count.


She held her breath silently counting each jarring clack of the second hand circling the clock signaling the passing of time. It seemed to move too slowly for her in comparison to the thrumming beat of her own heart. Each and every minute that passed was pure and utter agony.

He's never late.

With each and every tick her doubts multiplied escalating into various reasons for his tardiness.

Maybe he was detained over some paperwork. Perhaps he decided to finally stop for that milk she had been nagging him to pick up that morning. There was a magnitude of possibilities. Most of all, she hoped it wasn't the reason she dreaded the most.

Shaky hands went up to push back the stray strands of hair that precariously dangled over her now cold cup of tea. Her nerves were completely shot after being with the man for such a short time. She laughed to herself wondering how life had a strange way of turning out nothing like she imagined it to be.

There was a time long ago, when she would have stayed far away from a man like him. He was the one of those boys she fondly recalled in high school as one of the unattainable gods. Full chestnut locks of hair tumbling over almost black eyes that pierced right through her sending shivers down her spine. His gait was languid, cool, lacking any sense of purpose, but exuding an inner confidence amplified by his disarming smile. A body that had to have been hand sculpted by the hands of an artist that could encompass her, overwhelming every sense in her body leaving behind a weakened mess pliant and willing for anything he demanded. He was everything she was not- wealthy, handsome, charming, the list could go on.

Yes, he was the kind of boy that girls like her could have only dreamed of ever catching their attention. He was one of those boys she had steeled every fiber of her body against. It was her own foolish heart that had fallen completely in love with him.

She chuckled to herself in the dimly lit kitchen. Her eyes remained on the window looking outside watching the passing of lights filtering through it as the cars drove by. Her mind began to wander off giving her mind some reprieve from the darker thoughts. A small smile played on her lips as her finger traced an outline on the rim of her cup. She raised the finger to her pink lips sucking off the sweetened mixture of tea, sugar, and milk left from the spot where she drank.

-------------------------------------------

"Oh god, I knew I should have listened to Yuki when she told me it was going to rain," she moaned.

_Her head tilted upwards inspecting the darkened clouds overcast. The rumble of distant thunder seconded the foreboding of an impending storm. Just as she slipped past the heavy crowd of pedestrians in the morning rush, the skies seemed to heed her lament and burst open in a fresh downpour of cold, wet rain. She clutched her arms around herself as she ran the as far as she could go before a she broke down in wracking fits of shivers. An escape from the madness of others running away from the rain was found in an overhang in front of a closed and abandoned bookstore. Sighing in defeat, she decided to stand in the shelter until the downpour lightened. Her boss would not be especially angry for being a few minutes late to work considering the weather conditions. _

"_Whoa!" a masculine voice shouted beside her. He hopped into her narrow space occupying the rest of the dry area, yet coming a tad bit too close to her own personal space for comfort. "It's really raining cats and dogs out there."_

_She spared a small glimpse at the intrusive man holding back the inelegant snort that threatened to come out. Judging by his appearance alone, she knew better than to engage in conversation with the man. She wasn't one to be so critical of others, but the bad start of her day was waning her tolerance for others. _

"_Do you mind moving a bit over?" she harshly asked. _

"_Sorry," he fumbled in response. He carefully took a tiny step away from her; however, he did not once falter his gaze on her. "We were both lucky to find a dry place to get out of the rain for awhile, right?"_

_His small token of invitation into conversation wasn't welcomed. Instead a deadly silence was returned. _

_He shifted uncomfortably shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans. His body swayed back and forth as he rocked on his heels. Once more he attempted to catch her attention. _

"_Do you go to school around here?"_

_She sighed in exasperation realizing he was not going to shut or stop staring at her until she agreed to start talking to him. _

"_Can you stop staring at me?" she snapped. Her head whipped to the side to stare right back into his eyes. It was at that moment she felt her heart stop._

_She couldn't take her eyes off of him if she wanted to. Small droplets of water cascaded from his drenched hair leaving a fine trail of water down his face. His designer t-shirt clung to every muscle of his upper body revealing the tone, chiseled figure beneath it. _

_He chose to ignore her ride question and smiled for the first time at her drawing her into his web. "Can't blame a guy for staring at a pretty girl," he chuckled. _

_Underneath the shattering echo of rain hitting the pavement and the light clatter of droplets landing on the canopy above, her ears rang from his deep, husky laugh. She swallowed hard to get down that rising lump in her throat. Somewhere in the back of her mind, something was telling her to run- far and as fast away as possible. There was no chance of this man thinking she was a pretty girl. No guy had ever called her pretty except for her childhood friend that sadly harbored a ridiculous infatuation back in high school. With her mousy hair hastily tied up into twin braids on either side of her head and torn up jeans and worn out t-shirt, she was not exactly looking her best. Then again, there was always her self deprecating insistence that her body was still awkward and trying to figure out what was going on in her post-pubescent years. She was immensely thin from overworking herself in work and school and her short stature left not much comparison to most other girls._

"_Do you go to school around here?" he asked again bringing her out of her stunned shock._

"_Eitoku," she curtly answered._

_He nodded to her answer. "I go to Tokyo U."_

_It was even painfully obvious to her how out of her league he was. Not only was he handsome and rich, but he was smart, too._

_He shifted slightly before pulling one hand out of his pocket and extending it to her. "The name's Amakusa Seinosuke. But my friends call me Kin."_

_She warily put her hand in his startled by his firm grip. Her name was whispered back in a barely audible voice. _

"_Umm… I don't usually do this sort of thing, but do you think you would like to have a cup of coffee with me some time?"_

_The question was completely out of the blue blowing her away. She saw no reason for him to ask her out even if it seemed like a friendly non-threatening invitation. But being trapped in such an awkward situation alerted her fight or flight instincts. "I don't think so," she hurriedly yelled over her shoulder as she made a mad dash away from the overhang. _

_She didn't care that she got to work twenty minutes late. She neither cared that she ran away from a devastatingly handsome man nor the fact that she declined his offer to go out. All she knew was that it was a matter of preserving her own sanity to stay away from him. _

_Grumpily, she trudged to the front of the café after changing into her dry uniform. Most of the customers that had been inside when she first stormed in had left. It was most likely due to the rapid change in weather. Not a single cloud lingered in the sky as the sun awakened from its brief nap to shin down upon them. Her fingers fumbled with the ties of her apron before she set off to begin wiping off the tables and chairs set up outside for their patrons to dine at. As she started cleaning them off with a dry towel another set of hands wiping down the table in front of the seat she was working on stopped her. _

"_Need a little help?"_

_Before she could sputter a protest at his unannounced presence another voice interrupted her. _

"_Oh, I see you've met our newest hire, Kin. You remember I put up that ad for a new bus boy. Why don't you show him the ropes?"_

_She spun on her heel to meet the smiling face of her manager. A garbled gasp fell from her lips as her mind raced to attempt to decipher what was exactly going on. She turned back to the smirking man she had met earlier. _

"_Maybe this is even better than that cup of coffee."_

_-------------------------------------------- _

Things certainly turned out better than that initial offer for a cup of coffee. It turned out that Kin would end up working in the same café with her for the next three years to support themselves through university. After her denial of his interest in her, her resistance waned and eventually she did have that coffee with him. That only led to lunches, movies, dinners, and inevitably his proposal five years later on the exact day they met.

She smiled down at the simple gold wedding band on the left hand. If anyone asked her seven years ago if she would have married Amakusa Seinosuke, she would have laughed in their face. Being married even for the brief time of six months still felt surreal. They were still practically newlyweds.

Her time with him had enlightened her in many ways about his life other than knowing he attended Tokyo University. Her preconceived notion that he was wealthy was justified when he admitted her was an Amakusa referring to the old line of money stemming from real estate development. His father was the owner and president of the medium sized corporation. Although he had the money to pay his living expenses for about forty lifetimes through college, he chose to work in the small café busing tables to pay his way. In time, she learned of his quirks like his insane fascination with manga that matched only his love for the writings of Jack Kerouac. He was an odd mixture, a beautiful contradiction. More surprisingly, she learned he wanted nothing to do with his father's business and had no intentions to take it over even though he majored in business. His true calling was to join the police academy; thereby, denouncing his claim to the family fortune.

His father never quite forgave his son for refusing to join him, but after many months of not speaking to each other before the wedding, the old man conceded giving his blessing to both the marriage and his son's choice in occupation. The wedding was a small civil ceremony. The reasoning behind that was her insistence to not go overboard with the frivolities of marriage seeing as what mattered more was their exchange of vows rather than the grad hoopla that could go into it. The money was directed towards the much more reasonable expenditure of a small house where they hoped to one day start a family.

It was in the kitchen of that small house in which she currently sat in staring blankly out the window waiting for the familiar headlights of their car to pull up in the driveway. The life of a police officer was rough for both spouses. He risked his life each day with his career. It was his choice to work himself to near death climbing up the ladder from the poor rookie onto a criminal investigator for the special victims unit.

Now she lived the life of the doting wife waiting quietly at home watching the clock tick by. She hated it when he went on these late night calls. Waking up to the shifting of the bed as he crawled out beneath their warm covers left her with more than an empty spot beside her. A part of her heart would escape leaving behind a gaping hole of emptiness awaiting his return.

It was a rule they made when they were married that he would always call if he were to be late. Not once in their entire marriage had he ever broken that promise. No matter what he was doing, he would call to check in. Not once had he ever been a minute late from the hour of his promised return. The deep chasm of foreboding plunged through her body tearing through the strands of sanity holding her together.

The minute hand moved once more signaling the passing of yet another minute- fifteen to be exact.

Why haven't you called?

The shrill ringing of the telephone was the final break as her chair fell backwards. Her body reacted instantly running to the phone on the wall. Her nails scratched at the plastic phone in her scramble to get to it.

It felt exactly like that day they met under the overhang. She could clearly hear every raindrop's splatter against the ground clearly defined, separate from the rest. The clatter of noise amplified in her head almost drowning out the muffled voice over the phone. All feeling was lost except the pounding in her head matching the rain.

Over and over in her head she replayed his last words to her before he left her at the door with her fingers digging into the collar of her bathrobe to keep it closed.

"I love you."

She barely registered how her body managed to keep functioning after hanging up the phone. Her limp body sat on the couch in the living room. Tears refused to fall. Emotions were devoid of her. For how long she sat there, she did not know.

The pounding on the door was what interrupted her comatose state. Not a part of her body moved to open the door for the insistent person. Her name distantly resounded in the background of the rain and his voice resounding in her head. She barely lifted her head when the door was knocked down leaving behind a splintered door barely hanging onto its hinges.

He rushed in like the knight in shining armor she had always likened him to. As her husband's partner, she had come to really like the man trusting him almost as much as her husband. Racing to her side, he fell beside her wrapping his arms around her whispering her name over and over again to rouse her from her state.

"Tsukushi."

She barely recognized her own name, but responded nonetheless. Here eyes carefully studied the drips of rain soaking his skin and clothing. Her fingers shakily rose to touch the drops threatening to fall from the slop of his chin. Slowly her lips parted releasing a raspy voice that did not seem possible to come from her speaking the first words she would utter that night.

"It's raining."


End file.
